Jenna says:

Claire Danes is the actor who has won two consecutive Emmy (and Golden Globes and SAG awards) for the show. Carrie has always been the lead character. Is she neurotic? Yes. Is she unstable? Absolutely. That’s why she’s interesting. She’s smart and has good instincts, but her condition makes it hard for people to trust her and hard for her to trust herself. I give the show a lot of credit for not feeling the need to make her “likable” all the time.

Brody on the other hand was an interesting character for about two seasons. In the first season we saw him readjust to his old life while simultaneously planning an act or terror only to find that his old life won’t let him carry through. In season two we saw him as a double (and sometimes triple) agent, trying to play both sides. But the character had reached a natural stopping point. Showtime execs made a mistake by insisting he be kept around for a third season, because the writers didn’t know what to do with him. They focused on his family in his absence which slowed down the action considerably. Then it was just a matter of getting to a place where they could write him off the show. That’s not to say Damien Lewis wasn’t great. He was. But his character was only intended to last for so long.

Carrie is the character with more staying power because we can see trying to function and find her way in different situations. That’s always a challenge because she is unstable,